42nd Street – Music by Harry Warren | Lyrics by Al Dubin | Book by Michael Stewart & Mark Bramble | Directed & Choreographed by Randy Skinner | Music Supervision & Arrangements by Rob Berman | Music Direction by Adam Souza| Scenic Design by Michael Carnahan | Costume Design by Kara Harmon | Lighting Design by Cory Pattak | Sound Design by Jay Hilton | Projection Design by Shawn Duan | Wig, Hair & Make-Up Design by J. Jared Janas | Associate Director & Choreographer Sara Brians. At Goodspeed Musicals, Haddam, CT through November 6th.
by Linda Chin
The classic musical 42nd Street is set in 1933 NYC, when The Great Depression has drained people’s bank accounts and dampened their spirits, and where the bright lights of The Great White Way have dimmed. Producers and co-writers Bert Barry and Maggie Jones and director Julian Marsh are desperate for their new show Pretty Lady to be a hit. They’ve infused the show with comedic bits, big musical numbers, and sexual innuendo that should pack houses, and assembled a sensational cast. Jones knows that tapping dancers are crowd pleasers, and that taking her gaggle of chorus girls out to lunch makes for happier hoofers. Marsh, a brusque and hard-driving taskmaster, rallies his actors “to work and sweat and work some more,” and “dance ‘til your feet fall off” and in five weeks, “it’ll be the best damn show this town’s ever seen.”
Julian Marsh thinks of ‘musical comedy’ as “the most glorious words in the English language” but his beloved Pretty Lady is full of ‘backstage drama.’ The show’s financial backer, auto magnate Abner Dillon, has secured the leading lady role for his beau, Broadway veteran Dorothy Brock, but is unaware of her dressing room trysts with a man she really loves. Dorothy has a special dislike for Peggy Sawyer, a naïve newbie from Allentown PA, whose tap talents landed her a role in the chorus. When Dorothy falls during a pre-Broadway performance and breaks her ankle, she blames Peggy for tripping her. Without a leading lady who could step in immediately, the run must be cancelled, but the chorus kids rally for Peggy to get the role and save their hopes, dreams and jobs. Thirty-six hours later, right before she makes her Broadway debut, a proud director gives his protégé another pep talk: “Sawyer, You’re going out there a youngster. But you’ve got to come back a star!”
Goodspeed Musicals’ rousing revival of 42nd Street contains the dazzling choreography and big musical magic of the 1981 and 2001 Tony Award-winning Broadway productions that audiences have come to love and expect. Director and Choreographer Randy Skinner and team have “downsized” the production for a smaller cast and stage and “updated” aspects of the storytelling to be more relatable to, and reflective of 2022 artists and audiences, with spectacular results.
Entering the theater, you’re not met with a closed heavy red velvet curtain (or dark curtain-less stage), but beckoned by a colorfully painted, lightly illuminated scrim, the words ‘42nd Street’ jauntily emblazoned on a bright blue background. Once the overture begins, young and old theatergoers alike start swaying their shoulders and chair dancing. The iconic reveal – the scrim slowly rising to many pairs of dancing feet – elicits smiles, cheers, and spontaneous bursts of applause. This production also ingeniously incorporates projections to the stage. A newspaper dated 1933 sets the time and place. In another scene, colorfully costumed actors against a black and white backdrop (an archival photo of a passenger train at the station) make a stunning stage picture. When the train started moving (from still photo to video), gaining speed and hurtling into the audience, there were many audible gasps. The 21 actors on stage are all triple threats (42 dancing feet!); shout out to dance captain Kristy Fuller, who swung in seamlessly at the performance I attended. Lamont Brown (choreographer Andy Lee), Blake Stadnik (romantic lead Billy Lawlor), Annie Reilly (Eloise Kropp) and the entire ensemble have terrific skills and stamina and make the complex choreography look easy. And in this production, Dorothy Brock, typically known for her inability to dance (and cast accordingly) utilizes uber-talented two-time Tony nominee Kate Baldwin’s dance skills.
Goodspeed’s intimate space, and Skinner’s intimate understanding of how the production and its characters have evolved, give us to the chance to “come and meet the dancing feet” up close and in more depth. Baldwin’s portrays Brock less as a stereotypical prima donna than a woman in mid-life with a brilliant acting career, broken heart, and now a broken ankle, trying to make sense of her changing role in the world. Max von Essen shows less of Julian Marsh’s big ego and more of his soft power. I did shudder a bit watching the scene in the rehearsal room when he kisses Peggy – twice – to coach her for the love scenes, and breathed a sigh of relief when he doesn’t dive in for the final kiss in her dressing room, as scripted. Kate Baldwin’s rendition of I Only Have Eyes for You and Max von Essen’s rendition of Lullaby of Broadway show their expansive emotional and vocal ranges.
Carina-Kay Louchiey’s Peggy Sawyer is new to navigating the NYC theatre world but she’s not the stereotypical all beauty, no brains Broadway wannabe who’s had her head in the sand of small-town USA. Louchiey’s performance is pitch perfect – her dancing skills dazzling and her rendition of “42nd Street” sizzling. When Dorothy/Baldwin pays Peggy/Louchiey a visit to ‘her/their’ dressing room to wish her well, Peggy’s appreciation for the gesture, and admiration for Dorothy’s career success and wealth of experience and wisdom seems genuine and heartfelt. Her “old-fashioned” values of respect and gratitude are worth embracing in 2022, and make Louchiey’s Peggy Sawyer a modern role model worth cheering for.
In the 42nd Street film (1933), the Pretty Lady producers Barry and Jones were white men sporting fedoras and puffing cigars; the characters Bert Barry and Maggie Jones made their debuts in the 1980 Broadway musical, and returned in the 2001 revival. Goodspeed’s revival also reimagines the cast of 42nd Street, bringing this venerable institution closer to its stated goal of reflecting diverse communities on and offstage. Seeing actors who identify as women and people of color play professional powerhouses, including E. Clayton Cornelious and Lisa Howard as the Broadway producing and writing duo Bert Barry and Maggie Jones, Carina-Kay Louchiey as Peggy Sawyer, Lamont Brown as choreographer Andy Lee, David Jennings as show angel Abner Dillon; pairing actors of different races as newlyweds Bert and Annie in the Shuffle Off to Buffalo number (given that interracial marriage was not legal in New York State in 1933, but is more common in 2022) is inspiring. A sensational cast of triple threats that includes many BIPOC actors, and consistent with Peggy Sawyer’s dream, that gives non-professional and newer Equity actors the opportunity to work with experienced professionals make Goodspeed’s 42nd Street worth seeing – and cheering for. For tickets and information, go to: https://www.goodspeed.org/
